


Bonding

by B_Frizzy



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Canon-Typical Drinking, Cigarettes, Classism, Dex-centric, Gen, Minor Derek "Nursey" Nurse/WIlliam "Dex" Poindexter, No shipping, Poor Dex, Racism, Rants, in the form of fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-03
Updated: 2019-04-03
Packaged: 2020-01-01 11:51:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18334205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/B_Frizzy/pseuds/B_Frizzy
Summary: Dex and Cait bond over their similar histories.





	Bonding

**Author's Note:**

> Alright, yall.   
> before literally anything, i'm going to ask you not to interact if you're for some reason pissed about the content of this story. I wrote it as a short of rage response to some.... fandom disagreements. it's been sitting, complete, for literal months because i didn't know if i should actually post it or not. But, here it is.

Dex took the last drag of his cigarette and snubbed it out, then immediately lit up the next one. Even on the Reading Room, the noise from the Kegster was overwhelming, just this side of too much. He wished he could just hide in the library until it was over, but part of Bitty’s new rules included attending all SMH events related to hockey, and since the kegster ways to celebrate Hops’ hattie, he would definitely get in trouble for skipping out. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to be there to congratulate Hopes or celebrate with the team, it was just… when Chowder and Nursey got drunk together, it was really had to deal with them and basically impossible to avoid then. 

The noise of Chowder’s window sliding open startled Dex, and he ended up dropping ash all over his lap. He nearly yelled at whoever it was, but saw Farmer’s blonde head pop out at the last second. Instead, he sighed internally. If it were anyone else, he could be an asshole, but he couldn’t take his mood out on Cait. Not only did she not deserve it, but she was way too nice to deal with his mess.

She settled a few feet away from Dex, shivering a little in the cooling night air. After a few seconds of silence, she shifted a bit and pointed at the pack of cigarettes between them.

“Do you mind if I bum one?”

Dex raised an eyebrow, but nodded and slid them over, along with his neon plastic lighter. Farmer lit one up with practiced motions and tilted her head back to savor the first drag.

“I didn’t know you smoked.” Honestly, Dex thought he was just about the only person in Massachusetts who did from the amount of dirty looks and backhanded, “well meaninged” lectures he got about it. 

Farmer just shrugged. “Most people don’t. It’s mostly just a stress or drinking thing now, instead of a regular habit.”

“So is that a drunk cigarette or a stressed one?”

They weren’t super close; Dex didn’t think they had ever even been in the same room together without Chowder there too, but Dex really liked Cait. She was funny and down to Earth, more like the folks Dex grew up with than, say, Nursey.

She took a second before saying, “A little of both?”

He nodded, because he definitely understood that, but he didn’t even have a chance to respond before she continued on.

“I mean, not stress like finals or sports stress or anything. It’s just… Sometimes i get so frustrated at Chris that i just have to walk away before I smack him. Or Nursey, since they’re practically attached at the hip.”

“I get that.” Man, did he get that. 

Cait shot him a grin, like she knew he understood what she was saying. Somehow, it felt like some sort of inside thing, and that was something Dex hadn’t had in a while. At least, not like he had with other friends back home, or like Chowder and Nursey had, or Bitty and Lardo.

She tapped her cigarette against the solo cup that Dex had been using as an ashtray. “They’re so out of touch! I just need a break from how stupid they can be.”

“Even Chowder?”

Cait rolled her eyes. “God, especially him! Like, Nursey does that thing where he knows he’s saying something that will piss you off but does it anyway. But Chris… he just doesn’t realize that he’s said something bad until you’re red in the face and spitting mad.”

She took a deep drag and continued. “Like, okay. Chris was just talking about his family’s new vacation house. He said it wasn’t fair that his parents have to pay higher taxes on it, since they worked hard and put in extra effort to get it. And i totally understand where he’s coming from. His family doesn’t have, like, Nursey money, so it’s kind of hard on them to shell out the extra dough. Not that hard, but comparatively hard. But then Nursey got that look in his eye, and said that it wasn’t their fault that other people couldn’t afford it, and maybe they should put the work in, too, and they can benefit from it. And Chris agreed! He didn’t think about it at all, and didn’t realize how insensitive it was.”

Dex wanted to be surprised or angry on Cait’s behalf, but he just couldn’t muster it anymore. It had been two and a half long years of dealing with the exact same sort of comments. Any time he brought up something to do with being poor, it devolved into a pissing contest, and then a fight. He just started avoiding it altogether (even if it made him seem unapproachable or distant from the team). He hadn’t realized that Cait was in the same position as he was, though.

He stubbed out his cigarette, considering lighting another, but deciding against it. “Yeah, that sounds about right. That shit is 75% of the reason I’m hiding here instead of being down there, trying to hook up.”

Cait laughed. “Man, and here I just thought you were a jackass. Or, like, in love with Nursey and were pining from afar.”

Dex was pretty sure that if he had lit up again, he would have choked on it. Jesus Christ, in love with Nursey? Pining after him? “No. Nope. Hell no.”

He couldn’t believe that anyone thought that. Christ, they had negative things in common! They could barely be in the same room together. How the hell would that work with someone you were dating, or wanted to date? Something popped into his head and he turned to Cait, wide-eyed.

“Wait, does everyone think that?”

“I mean, you’ve gotta admit that the constant fighting looks an awful lot like sexual tension.”

“No! It doesn’t! Sexual tension looks like you want to end an argument with hate sex, not by ripping the other person’s head off.”

Not that Nursey wasn’t incredibly attractive, but Dex could barely look at his face without feeling that horrible rage-disappointment-shame that made him want to fight Nursey just on principle. Or maybe break down. Maybe at first, way back in their frog year, he held a flame. They didn’t have the long history of teasing, and chirping, and unhealthy friendship. Dex was still attracted to him sexually, but being pretty wasn’t enough to be attractive.

“I can barely even talk to him anymore. I mention my family, and he asks about their jobs, like it’s some kind of joke that they all work two or three apiece. I talk about my old hockey team or teammates, and he asks what it felt like to buy a used cup at Goodwill. I put on a shirt, he makes fun of hand-me-downs. I get my fucking hair cut, he questions if I’m actually poor, since I ‘can afford to get it done so often’.” 

No, Dex and nursey would never happen, not unless something seriously changed, and Dex wasn’t going to.

Cait scooted closer and threw an arm around his shoulders. He could smell Chowder’s cologne on her sweater.

“For what it’s worth, I was freaking out once because my mom’s car broke down and she wouldn’t be able to make it to her oncologist appointment the next day. Chris just asked why she didn’t just take it to a mechanic. He genuinely didn’t understand that not everyone could drop several hundred dollars the second something went wrong. You just have to explain it to him, and I bet Nursey is the same way.”

“I’m sorry.” Dex could only imagine how shitty it felt to try and get empathy from your significant other in that situation, only to have to face the casual classism that was almost worse than the overt things. And he understood what she was saying, but it just wasn’t the same with Nursey as with Chowder.

“The thing is, though, Chowder is willing to listen to you. He respects your perspective on things. When i try to explain things to Nursey, genuinely try to get him to see where I’m coming from, he takes it as some sort of challenge over who suffered most. And I’m always going to lose, because I’m a white male and i will never face the racism that he does, but as he’s pointed out before, there’s no saying he won’t experience being poor at some point.”

Cait pulled him closer into her side and Dex leaned on her a little more heavily. Even though it was just a half-hug, it felt really good.

The noise around them was dying down some. Most of the crowd seemed to have moved indoors. Dex still had to strain to hear Cait, though, because she was nearly whispering when she said, “That’s total bullshit.”

He tried to shrug it off. He knew it, but at that point, he was just exhausted trying to defend himself. Can’t didn’t let him, though.

“I’m serious. The guys might not see it or acknowledge your struggles, but i absolutely see you. Growing up in the way you did, the way we did, it changes everything about you. I have to work harder with my coaches to follow my nutrition plan, since I binge eat because I grew up food insecure. I’m just not used to being able to eat when I need to, and not just when food is available. I have panic attacks when my shoes or bag or whatever break, because i don’t know where the money is going to come from. I still smuggle food from the dining hall, because it’s a left over habit from taking extra food home from school for my younger siblings. I can’t budget to save my life, because i never learned how to use money responsibly.

“Hell, even these!” She waved the now nearly-empty pack of cigarettes between them. “This is a poor habit! Something like 75% of people who smoke are below the poverty line, because we can’t afford proper treatment to break the addiction or for a suitable replacement for a calming habit.”

She seemed almost on the verge of tears, but kept on going, like she was on some sort of mission. “We will never know what it’s like to face the racism that either Chris or Nursey face, just like you three will never know what it’s like for me to be an afab person. But those facts absolutely do not mean that we haven’t faced struggles and classism, nor does it lessen Nursey’s struggles at all.”

Dex didn't’ know how much he needed to hear all of that until Cait was doing saying it. It was all stuff that he knew, intellectually, but when he was surrounded by people (and friends) who constantly and very vocally disagreed, it was really hard to feel like he wasn't in the wrong.

He leaned his head against her shoulder, feeling settled in a way he never realized that he wasn’t at Samwell. She understood. She lived it,too. It was their first one-on-one conversation, but in some ways, she already understood him on a level that none of his teammates and friends did or could.

“Thank you.”

Cait pressed a light kiss to the top of his head. Dex lost track of how long they stayed like that, in comfortable silence. Long enough that the music and the dozens of strings of fairy lights in the backyard had been turned off. They were both nearly shivering from the cold by the time Cait’s phone started chirping, breaking them out of their moment.

**Author's Note:**

> i don't really care if you find any mistakes. sorry if it happens to distract you, but i didn't edit very closely.


End file.
